Where to start with the report released Monday afternoon on the Air Force Academy rape scandal? This one comes from the panel ordered by angry Congressmen this spring, tired of the BS they were getting from the Air Force. (The prime movers were Colorado Senator Wayne Allard, and Senator John McCain. You can read the entire 141-page report in PDF, or the NYT story, or the better Denver Post story (yes, the Denver Post did a much better job than the NYT on this one.)) 

The first thing to say is that it really is a breakthrough. It is the first independent review from outside the military, and it shows. (It was hand-picked by Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, but composed of outsiders who obviously felt no obligation to cover his butt. It was led by former Florida congresswoman Tillie Fowler.)

It gives credit where credit is due--praising much of the pentagon's spring solution, the Agenda For Change--but slamming the hell out of not just Academy leadership, but Pentagon leadership, who were repeatedly made aware of a severe problem for at least a decade and ignored it. And then it accuses the Pentagon of a coverup.

It also delivers a thorough assessment of the Agenda being implemented to improve the culture, identifying key holes in the plan. Rape advocates will be overjoyed that they have finally been heard. I spoke to both local and national rape advocates this spring in my Salon story analyzing the Agenda, and they were thrilled with some provisions of the Agenda, but dismayed that seemed doomed to failure because it did nothing to get women to come forward to report their rapes. In fact, it made reporting less likely, by eliminating the only confidential options. Today's report discloses that a 1997 Inspector General report acknowledged that as few as one in ten rapes were being reported, a figure validated again late last month, by another IG report. If much of your solution addresses fails to address 90 percent of the problem, that's a gaping hole. This report finally addresses the insanity of that approach (using much milder language, of course, but highlighting it in the exec summary).

Now about that coverup:

Late this spring, the Air Force dispatched its own "Working Group," to investigate the problem, and in June, the Air Force general counsel released its report clearing itself of "systematic acceptance of the problem." This group flatly rejected that finding and stated, "This Panel believes that the Air Force General Counsel attempted to shield Air Force Headquarters from public criticism by focusing exclusively on events at the Academy."

The new report dedicates more than a quarter of its executive summary to details of the coverup. It then concludes that the Pentagon is responsible and "Those responsible should be held accountable." It laments that many of the culprits are retired and out of reach, and again states "there must be further accounting."

It's hard to know exactly how to read that, but they could be calling for the head of Air Force Secretary Jame Roche, who President Bush has attempted to promote to Secretary of the Army, pending Senate approval.

The Denver Post say, "The report makes 21 specific recommendations for change at the school," though I have not read all of them yet. It praises the Agenda For Change several times, while noting some key flaws, which is exactly what my analysis showed last spring. Which has to make me wonder--couldn't the initial Air Force team involved more outsiders and avoided some of its inherent myopia in the first place?

All I did was talk to an assortment of nationally-recognized military scholars, rape advocates, faculty and cadets. They spoke to a lot of the same people, but it was exclusively Air Force officers conducting the interviews and making the decisions (along with AF Secretary Roche). If they could have accepted the existence of their own blinders and included some outsiders in the decision-making, they could have arrived at the current, more enlightened report months earlier.

There's a nice summary of the Agenda in the new report, which goes to the heart of what still needs to change:

The Agenda for Change is evidence that the Air Force, under Secretary Roche's leadership, is serious about taking long-overdue steps to correct the problems at the Academy, but in certain respects it does not go far enough to institutionalize permanent change. The most important of these shortcomings are:

• Culture and Climate of the Academy. The Agenda for Change recognizes that the sexual assault problems at the Academyare related to the culture of the institution, yet it does not go far enough to institute enduring changes in the culture and gender climate at the Academy.
• Command Supervision. The Agenda for Change does not address the need for permanent, consistent oversight by Air Force Headquarters leadership. [Because Academy leaders roll over every two years, so there is no consistency for a long-term solution.]
• External Oversight. The Agenda for Change does not address the need to improve the external oversight provided by the Academy's Board of Visitors.
• Confidentiality Policy. The Agenda for Change effectively eliminates the Academy's confidential reporting policy for sexual misconduct. In doin go, however, it reomves critical options for sexual assault victims to receive confidential counseling and treatment, and may result in the unitended consequences of reducing sexual assault reporting.

They're dead-on with all of those, particularly the last one.

Here are the other passages I found most illuminating:

The Panel examined and reviewed the culture and environment at the Academy. It found an atmosphere that helped foster a breakdown in values which led to the pervasiveness of sexual assaults and is perhaps the most difficult element of the problem to solve. . . .

The Panel has found deficiencies in the Honor Code System and in the Academy's character development programs that helped contribute to this intolerable environment. . . .

The situation demands institutional changes, including cultural changes. these changes are incremental and cannot be made overnight.

Lot of wisdom coming from this panel. I'm really impressed. They demand aggressive change now, while facing the reality that true cultural change takes a long time--and that actually effecting it is a delicate art form.

Nice work independent panel. Very nice work.